Resealing Cabin House Fixed Ports?

[Howie]

Has anyone resealed, removed, or rebedded the long port lights on the cabin house?Our 1979 O'Day37 has the two long nonopening port lights in the main cabin, we're getting a few small leaks thru and i can see the previous owners tried using a little silicone around the edges. I'm curious to how these remove before attemping it! I've also seen some replacements made for more common sized portlights that actually have a Beckson style opening port in the middle of them. I havent seen any in the correct shape for the 37 but i'm willing to bet that what Defender sells can be cut or modified to fit!thanks~howie

 

[Peter]

leaky portlights

On my O'Day 25, I had small leaks on the fixed portlights (2 each side) over the setees in the main cabin. On the inside each portlight has a whitish polymer "bezel" that surrounds the (acrylic? lexan?) transparent part. The bezel is held fast by lots (on the order of 20) screws around its periphery. I carefully firmly (re)tightened each on of these screws, being careful (by feel) not to go too far and strip something. This stopped the leak in each one. As I recall 3 out of the 4 were leaking. You might try this. It's a lot easier than rebedding them, which may not be necessary.

 

[howie]

simple

Wow, guess i should just start with the simplest way right? Sounds like the same type of window on my 37 and I'll try the screws next time up! thanks

 

[Bob Amos]

Be careful!

Peter, you are right to be careful not to strip out anything, if your boat is anything like my Oday 28. I recently replaced all six opening ports on my 28 (I understand from Rudy Nickerson that 1980 was one of the years you could special order opening ports all around.) Anyway, there is no coring between the two sides of the deckhouse and it is very easy to strip out the fiberglass. I tried to strengthen this by epoxying small plywood squares behind the fiberglass (between the halves of the deckhouse) and pre-drilling them. Used a quick drying two part epoxy and was able to do two ports per day. This seemed to work very well, I was able to cinch down the screws pretty tight and didn't spin one of them. Just a suggestion if you ever have to get into a port or fixed window replacement...